'Sick ex-cop ran building firm on the side'

A FORMER Pangbourne police officer, who had been injured at work, swindled nearly £60,000 in benefits while on sick leave despite running a building firm on the side, Reading Crown Court heard yesterday.

Ex-PC Shane Bond is accused of repeatedly playing on a wrist injury, received while making an arrest in May 1996, during a three-year scam that ended when he applied for a lucrative police pension.

The court heard he complained to bosses his left hand was "completely useless", with doctors first diagnosing him 14 per cent disabled in 1998, a year later 25 per cent and in February 2000 80 per cent disabled.

During this time he was claiming to be too injured to work and was on sick leave.

In February 2001 he applied for a permanent medical pension and the police decided to check the extent of his injuries again.

A police doctor's examination revealed the injury was not as bad as the former police constable claimed and a surveillance operation was launched.

The court heard Bond, 39, had moved to Cornwall where he set up a damp-proofing business.

Surveillance officers observed him carrying out work and having horse riding lessons with his daughter.

Prosecuting, Philip Shorrock said Bond wrote to personnel officers in the Thames Valley force telling them "life had become something of a misery and a trial".

Bond said he "was contemplating suicide", "living like a recluse" and "unable to get on with his wife and children".

Mr Shorrock said: "If that were the true picture, this would be a sorry tale indeed, of an officer doing his best on the public's behalf.

"But the prosecution say that is not the whole story."

The court heard Bond had applied for the permanent medical pension while running an advertisement for "Bond's Woodworm and Damp Proofing".

Bond, who denies all allegations, was seen

driving a car, carrying goods in both hands and transferring them from one hand to another, the prosecution stated.

Mr Shorrock told the court Bond, of Tredinnick Moor, Penzance, placed an advertisement in Yellow Pages boasting 17 years experience in the trade and a 30-year guarantee on work.

The ad attracted Ronald Webb and Suzanne Small who employed him to carry out work on their cottage. Both saw Bond, wearing a wrist support, re-point brickwork on the outside of their new home.

Nigel Smitherham, former branch manager at Jewson's builders' merchants in Penzance, saw Bond, sporting a wrist support, visit his store about 10 to 12 times in a year, on one occasion

collecting plaster, paints, timbers, and 40kg of

aggregate chips.

The manager said: "He collected building materials from the branch - sand, cement, plasterboard. He would have had to have a vehicle to take them away.

"We only had one person in the yard and customers had to load their vehicles themselves."

Bond denies one count of obtaining £6,157.28 by

deception from the benefits agency between February 2000 and July 2001, one count of obtaining £52,314.26 by deception from Thames Valley Police from July 98 to July 2001.

He also denies a further charge of attempting to obtain a pension from the police authority between July 98 and July 2001.